FW: [casual_games] Copycats -- What Can Be Done?

[Paul Thelen]

Jamie - 

I just subscribed so I could respond. 

 

Big Fish Games did not develop nor publish this game, Oberon did.  We
are investigating with James if they swapped out original sounds prior
to ship as the video was made from a beta build.  First pass appears
that they did so we just removed the video and will redo it.

 

A big to do about nothing ;-)

 

Paul


p.s. I do accept flowers for apologies

________________________________

From: casual_games-bounces at igda.org
[mailto:casual_games-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf Of Jamie Carlson
Sent: Wednesday, July 19, 2006 9:55 AM
To: casual_games at igda.org
Subject: RE: [casual_games] Copycats -- What Can Be Done?

I've always been on the somewhat "ambivalent" side of the Copycat fence.
Which is to say that I really don't like how all of these developers
just change the theme of the game but keep the core game mechanics
almost entirely untouched, but what can you do about it? As this thread
has proven, it is a very tough legal battle. 

Conversely, in the example of Luxor vs. Zuma, I think that the Luxor
devs changed a pretty sizable amount to Zuma's Match-3 formula and made
a compelling alternative play experience that is more than worthwhile on
its own.

But... (and this really just seems wrong)...

Bigfishgames has a new exclusive Zuma/Luxor clone called "Dynasty" and
one of the things I love about Bigfishgames (any portals listening, you
should Clone this feature!) is that they have that little video Flash
app running on each of the new game pages with gameplay footage. So I'm
watching the video for Dynasty and notice that they have a "free
roaming" flying dragon (which seems to eliminate much of the difficulty
if you ask me, but I digress) and admit that is probably going to be a
sufficient change to the gameplay to make it "different enough"... So
that's fine... 

However, when I turn up the volume a bit I notice that they are using
some of the sound effects that are EXACT copies of sound fx straight out
of Zuma! (the "slow down" sfx and "explosion" sfx sound exactly the
same)

        Take a listen:
 
http://www.bigfishgames.com/downloads/dynasty/index.html?src=bfg12y0xenl
0113 

I mean, the devs can't do THAT!  Can they?  To be fair, I suppose
there's the chance that Bigfishgames lazily just added those sound
effects for the video without thinking about it, but I'm very doubtful
of that...

Don't get me wrong, I've created a bunch of sound effects in the past by
using stock samples from audio libraries and then bringing them into my
Audio Editor and would just "tweak 'em" enough to make them sound
unique... But to lift "copyrighted" content/media from another product
in your own field, that's a no-no from a legal perspective so it's so
easy to compare/contrast the two samples.

- Jamie




>> On 4/27/06, *Jim Stern* <jstern at iwin.com <mailto:jstern at iwin.com>>
wrote:
>>
>> I know there have been quite a few discussions in the past about 
>> developers and publishers being frustrated with all the cloning that
is 
>> being done in games.  In some cases, the new games are clearly an 
>> improvement from their predecessors, and they can help to push the
bar 
>> toward higher quality games.  In other cases, they literally are 
>> mimicking the same UI, layouts, game play, and art style.  I would
like 
>> to know if anyone has information on:
>>
>>  
>>
>> 1)        Legal steps that can be done to thwart this kind of
activity 
>> (whether certain parts of the game are copyrightable or if there is 
>> legal precedence to get the offending party to cease and desist), and
>>
>> 2)        Whether people are taking a stand against working with 
>> developers who are clearly violating the rights of those who
developed 
>> the original idea
>>
>>
>> Thanks.
>>
>>
>> Jim Stern
>> iWin, Inc.

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